Using Calling Cards
To Keep In Touch With The Folks

8. Keeping In Touch Back Home While Studying Acting In NYC

Using Calling Cards or VOIP to keep in touch back home are musts! Don’t do like I did on my very first trip to New York. I had a tri band telephone with a vodafon account in Italy. I knew that it would be more expensive to make calls with that phone and service while in the US, because you have to pay vodafon and the local provider as well, so it’s expensive! I used it to call my son back in Italy every day or receive his calls and I used it to make local calls even if I was conscious of my spending and tried to keep costs down by spending little time on the phone. After almost three months, I had spent about €1.000!

Today I’m much smarter. There are a couple things you can do to keep in touch for just pennies a day and talk as long as you want on the phone.

Perhaps the most economical way is e-mail, but that might not be good enough. If not the next best thing and by far the cheapest is to get a skype or msn messenger account. I personally have skype. Just go to skype.com and download the software. It’s really easy! All you need is a microphone and a headset and if your computer already has a built in mike and speakers then you’re all set, even if the quality will be better if you have the mic and the headset. At any rate, you call directly from your computer!

The cost

If you call from your computer to a land-line, home or office-based telephone just about anywhere in the world, it will cost you €0,017 per minute.

If you call from your computer to a cellular phone just about anywhere in the world except the US, it will cost you €0,25 per minute.

And here’s the best thing of all. If you call from your computer using skype to another person anywhere in the world who also receives your call using their skype account, you pay nothing!

I kept in touch with my son for most of the time I was in NY and it cost me very, very little.

Calling Cards

You can get calling cards at just about any newsstand. There are so many, but you have to be careful to get the right ones. The way they work is that on the card itself, they give you a number, either a local or toll free number to call to access the service. After getting connected, you will be asked to insert the calling card number. After that you will be asked to dial the number of the person you are trying to reach.

Here’s the trick. With some calling cards, even if you don’t get through, they still charge you for the call. The one I usually get is New York Alliance Card. They don’t do that. They charge you only for a call where you actually get connected. New York Alliance Cards are available in $5, $10, $20 and to give you an idea of how much time you get to talk, for a $5 card, you get about 300 minutes, which is 5 hours of conversation IF, you call a fixed, home- or office-based number. If on the other hand you call a cellular phone back home, that same $5 card will get you about 20 minutes of conversation! So what’s the moral of the story? Don’t call cellular phones if you can help it! Use calling cards!

Still another way for you to stay in touch back home is to get your folks to either get a skype or msn messenger account or get calling cards. The one I use while back in Italy is the Sisal Europe and USA card that comes out of the same machine that the super enal lotto cards come out of. All countries have these kinds of cards by now, so just inform yourself. The other good thing is that while you, while in the USA you get penalized if you use a calling card when calling a cellular phone back home, your folks back home who call you on your cellular phone with a US provider while you’re in NY do not get penalized. They pay the same rate whether they call a fixed phone number or a cellular one. At least from Italy it is this way. The bottom line is that while you are taking acting classes in the USA, you don’t have to spend an arm and a leg to keep in touch back home.

Getting a cellular phone and service while in the USA: First of all, if you have a tri-band telephone, you can use it in the US. You’ll just want to change your provider as we just discussed to avoid paying too much for both local and long-distance calls. Just make sure that it is compatible with the service the provider gives you. Let me explain.

I have a tri band phone that is a Samsung, but I also brought with me my old Nokia, old faithful. I noticed that while I could receive calls with my Samsung, whenever I tried to call someone, 75% of the time the line was busy. I thought to myself that the line can’t be busy that often. What I found out was that my Samsung phone was not compatible with Cingular frequencies and that’s why it didn’t work so well. I pulled ‘old faithful’ back out again and used the Nokia Phone.

Just like in Europe, there are the usual battles between providers. They all have their promotions and in the end it is difficult to say which one is better or worse.

The provider I use is Cingular. I pay $49 per month and that comes with about 200 minutes and nights (after 21.00 and before 06.00) and weekends are absolutely free for calls made to anywhere in the USA. There’s another thing to keep in mind. Not only do you pay for calls you make, you also pay for the time you talk when you receive calls. So be careful to keep that in mind.

If you don’t happen to have a phone, they will give you one sometimes for a small rental fee or you can buy one dirt cheap.

1. Your objective
2. The right time to go
3. Length of your stay

4. Your budget

5. Choosing the acting school and the acting classes

6. Finding housing

7. Getting around in New York

8. Keeping in touch back home while you’re away

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Hi Tony
I would like to thank you for helping me with the monologue question I asked in October 2007. I went to the auditions for a Drama course and I am happy to say that I have been accepted as a first-year student at the Tshwane University of Technology. Please keep on sending me those newsletters and let me know where I can find books that will help me in my acting career. Thank you once more. Have a blessed day.
Sincerely
Edward Thaba -South Africa

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Hi,
I was wondering if there is anything established like actingstartup.com in the U.K. because you are amazing and I have learned loads...
Thank You.
Nadine., Newcastle, UK

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Dear Anthony,
Just wanted to thank you for bringing me in to [audition for the video], meet you and chat this Saturday. I was really excited to hear about your working on actingcareerstartup.com and even took a look at it today - it's awesome! You are very well-spoken, knowledgeable and enthusiastic, and it shows through the work that you do! I hope our paths in the industry will cross again and really enjoyed meeting you. Thanks, again and best wishes with your very important work!
Warmly,
Gretchen, NY, NY

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Hey Tony, thanks for the info, yours by far is the most useful, I am 30 years old, and I myself always (secretly) wanted to be an actress, but I never knew where to begin, so thank you. You have given me hope!
Ana C., Tampa, FL

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Hi, I’m John.
You answered a question for me about two weeks ago about how to write my cover letters…I want you to know your advice was helpful. I got called in for a part as an extra in my first movie! It’s not big, but it’s my first one! Thanks for your help!
John, San Diego, CA